


golden cages (and roads paved with good intentions)

by TheTruthAboutLove



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon with a twist, Episode: s04e12, F/F, Neron is a bitch, Purgatory is different
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:53:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22135861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheTruthAboutLove/pseuds/TheTruthAboutLove
Summary: [Canon Divergence from s04e12]“Purgatory is designed to be the target's perfect place, somewhere they're as happy and content as they could ever be. It's a trap, the longer the trap goes on, the smoother it runs, the harder it becomes to get out,” Nora explains.“So the demon can get in,” John adds and Nora wants to slap him because there was no need to say it out loud, to make Sara hear the words.“Once the odd feeling dissipates and she decides it's perfect there, she wants to stay forever there, then her soul moves on. And Neron can-” she stops, glances at Sara.“He can't have her. Not her,” Sara whispers. “Send me there, I'll get her out.”[...]She gets up slowly, the room is empty except for them, Nora and John not back yet. She turns to Sara, who's staring at her with a frown, shoulders tense, like maybe Ava's not herself, like maybe she hasn't truly come back because she hasn't jumped into Sara's arms kissing her and thanking her yet.Like maybe Neron truly got to her.Maybe he has. Hehas. Just not in the way Sara was afraid he would.“You should've left me there.”
Relationships: Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe
Comments: 35
Kudos: 279





	golden cages (and roads paved with good intentions)

**Author's Note:**

> Please bare in mind this was written a while ago when I knew nothing about the crossover and it's just an angty take about Purgatory as I would have designed it.

There's light coming from the window, a bird chirping happily a few feet from the house is the only sound she can hear for a moment, before the honk of a car makes her groan and turn over and she buries her face in her pillow again, wishing she could stay asleep for one more minute.

Someone chuckles beside her and she groans again, but opens her eyes when arms are around her and lips are pressing into her cheek. Sara looks too good and too awake for it to be the crack of dawn, but she is and Ava can only look at her, mesmerized.

Everything's as perfect as always but she has this sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, like maybe they've fought the night before, like maybe they aren't even supposed to be _together_ right now, let alone this happy and content and safe.

“Good morning, baby,” Sara whispers, kissing the top her head, breathing in the smell of honey shampoo mixed with Ava's scent.

Ava feels the words on her tongue but fights them, for some reason, feels like they shouldn't come out, doesn't _want them to come out_ , and yet- yet she finds herself saying, “Good morning, my love,” instead of asking Sara what is she doing there, why aren't they fighting anymore, and _what_ were they even fighting about?

The memory's fuzzy at best and dream-like at the edges, like maybe it wasn't even real, maybe it didn't even happen at all. Ava wants it to be a dream so badly that it's easy to convince herself it was, to lean into the hope that it was all a horrible nightmare, already fading in her mind.

“Are you okay, Ava?” Sara asks when she sees how reluctant she is with her answer, how conflicted she got about a simple greeting.

“I am,” she says, because there's nothing objectively wrong with her, nothing that isn't an odd feeling in the pit of her stomach that she could never explain even if she tried. And there's a bird still chirping outside the window, there is sunlight warming her skin and she's in the arms of the woman she loves, so really, what other answer is she supposed to give? “Everything's perfect.”

Sara smiles and kisses her lips and Ava smiles back, ready for another day in the perfect lives they lead.

  
  


Ava makes breakfast for Remi and Sam, Amy is refusing to eat anything that isn't yellow this week, so she chews down a banana while her siblings gulp down their own meals. On their way out, she straightens the picture hanging by the front door before leaving, smiling at it, ignoring the way her heart clenches.

Quentin is smiling. Laurel is smiling. _Should_ they be smiling? Why does Ava feel unsettled by the sight of a picture with the Lance's family and her own family together? They're laughing. They're happy. Ava should be happy looking at it.

She closes her eyes and tries to shake the feeling off, walking out the door and driving her children to school.

After they're safely delivered, she calls her mom on her way from the school to work, once she's alone in the car, like she does every other morning, to check that her parents are doing okay.

“You and Sara should come visit soon, I miss you, darling.”

“I miss you, too,” Ava says, but doesn't really feel a gaping void. It's more of a dull pain, something aches inside her and for the life of her she can't make any sense of it. “ _I always miss you, or maybe I've never missed you at all_ ”, she thinks, but doesn't dare say it. “We could come to Fresno for Thanksgiving, if Sara can get a few days off.”

“Great! Oh, I can't wait to see my grandkids again, I'm sure they've grown up so much since we visited in July!”

Her mother blabbers on, and Ava focuses on remembering what they did this year on the 4th of July but can't remember anything clear for the life of hers. She knows her parents were there, because her mom just said so, and of course their kids had to be there as well, but the more she thinks the less she can come up with, and her brain keeps presenting her with this image of Sara dressed in patriotic lingerie whispering into her ear, but that can't be right, because they have kids, they have families, and that certainly wasn't how they spent that day this year.

Her mom asks if she's listening and Ava focuses back on their conversation, her grip on the steering wheel tightening until her knuckles turn white.

  
  


They make dinner together. They always try to make dinner together if they're both home, it gives them time alone to chat and joke and smile between silly pranks and stolen kisses and everything is so perfect it seems hardly fair.

Sara is sweet and unguarded in a way that makes Ava's heart burst with happiness and her stomach bottoms out when she feels guilt along with it. Why is she feeling guilty? They're happy, they've been for a while. Everything's worked out exactly how it was supposed to. Yet, when Sara smiles at her, open and free, Ava's smile is forced and she can't help but frown a little. This is what they've worked for, what they've built. This is the happiness she fought for, she earned it, it belongs to her.

“I love you,” Sara says.

Ava doesn't hesitate when she says, “I'll always love you.”

There's a “but” on the tip of her tongue and she swallows it down, melts it away. They're happy. They're happy. Everything's perfect, so they _have_ to be happy and this feeling she has about something being very, very wrong, can't be in the way of it.

Everything's perfect, Ava reminds herself with a voice that barely sounds like her own.

  
  


//

  
  


There's light coming from the window, a bird chirping happily, she hears the honk of a car. She buries her face in her pillow and groans, then there are lips pressing into her cheek.

Everything's as perfect as always.

“Good morning, baby,” Sara whispers.

“Good morning, my love.”

“Are you ok, Ava?”

“I am. Everything's perfect.”

Everything's perfect, perfect, _perfect_.

  
  


She straightens the picture, staring at Laurel Lance. She sees her everyday. She works with Laurel every single day. Sometimes, she works with Quentin as well. She almost can't stand to look at her own parents smiling at the camera at all. Something about this picture just doesn't sit right with her.

  
  


“You and Sara should visit soon, I miss you, darling.”

“I miss you, too.”

Sometimes, actually, Ava feels like she doesn't even know her mother at all, that's how deeply she misses her, she feels like she never even met her, like her own mother never even existed at all.

  
  


“I love you.”

“I'll always love you.”

But... But. Weren't they supposed to be taking a break, weren't they fighting about something, weren't they hiding their feelings from each other? But weren't they always too guarded for it to be like this? But aren't they so focused on their jobs that they barely have time to see each other, let alone have a house, a mortgage, three kids, all this perfection, all this love, all this-

No. _No_.

Everything's perfect, the voice in her head tells her. They _have_ to be happy. Ava's perfect, Sara's perfect, their family's perfect.

She _is_ happy.

  
  


//

  
  


“Good morning, baby,” Sara says and the bird chirps.

Ava smiles, soft and happy and completely devoid of worry. She answers with no hesitation, “Good morning, my love.”

Sara doesn't ask if she's ok, there's no reason to: Ava's happy and everything's perfect.

  
  


She straightens the picture by the front door. Quentin, Laurel, Dinah, her parents, her children, Sara. They're all smiling. Ava's smiling, too. And even now, she's smiling just looking at it.

  
  


“You and Sara should visit soon. I miss you, darling.”

“I miss you, too.”

The haven't seen each other since her parents visited in July, they had a barbecue in their backyard, Sara cooked burgers and Ava made pie. Her parents brought wine and Quentin lit some small fireworks he had confiscated, Laurel was standing by with Sam on her shoulders so she could see them properly – the kid was almost undetachable from her aunt at times – and Sara safely tucked in Ava's arms, Amy and Remi helping Quentin while Dinah scolded them from a safe distance.

Truly a perfect day, Ava remembers it perfectly.

  
  


“I love you.”

“I'll always love you.”

There isn't a but on the tip of her tongue anymore.

  
  


//

  
  


Sara is pacing, a trembling hand on her lips, like she's trying to keep herself from making any sounds at all.

Nora's pretty sure that, if she didn't have fingers pressed to her lips, she would be screaming by this point. It's too much, it's too painful to take in all at once, and she's been friends with Ava for just a few weeks. She thinks of a gentle hand into hers, squeezing when Nora wouldn't look at her, letting it go only to hug Nora when her eyes started to fill with tears. She thinks of an assertive voice, and a gentle touch contradicting it, when Ava was trying to be stern with her. This is almost too painful for _her_ , and Ava's just her best friend.

Sara... well, Nora is pretty sure Ava's the love of Sara's life.

“She's been there too long,” John says.

_We weren't there in time_ , is what they all hear instead. _We should've looked earlier, we missed her so much and yet didn't look, we failed her, we failed her, we failed-_

“Purgatory is designed to be the target's perfect place, somewhere they're as happy and content as they could ever be. It's a trap, the longer the trap goes on, the smoother it runs, the harder it becomes to get out,” Nora explains.

“So the demon can get in,” John adds and Nora wants to slap him because there was _no need_ to say it out loud, to make Sara hear the words.

“Once the odd feeling dissipates and she decides it's perfect there, she wants to stay forever there, then her soul moves on. And Neron can-” she stops, glances at Sara.

“He can't have her. Not her,” Sara whispers. “Send me there, I'll get her out.”

John looks at Nora, Nora looks at the ground, and neither of them wants to be the one who has to say it, but alas someone must.

“Ray's happy place would be camping,” Nora says instead. “With bugs, and humidity and campfires and s'mores. You could get Ray out of Purgatory in a heartbeat.”

“Mick's would be Aruba. Too hot and boring for a lass like you,” John says. “Sharpie's-” he clears his throat. “Ava's-” it's almost worse, because if he stops making fun of her, if he says her actual name, Sara knows, it means Ava's doomed and nowhere near close to coming back.

“What do you think yours might be like?” Nora asks instead.

There's a flash of understanding in Sara's eyes and then she looks desperate and far more scared than Nora's ever seen her and Nora once tried to lure her into joining Team Mallus by showing her Sara's greatest regrets and fears.

“Her. It would be her,” she chokes out, but drags another cot next to Ava's like she doesn't care if this kills her. If it kills them both.

“Usually, a demon takes the time to put the work in, until it knows the target's deepest desires, their character, their flaws. Neron doesn't know Sharpie that well since he's been playing with Heywood Senior for a while, but,” John sighs. “It might still be close enough to her – and to your – idea of a perfect life.”

“I can save her,” Sara says stubbornly.

“Time works differently, maybe she's been there for months,” he tries again.

“I can _save_ her.”

“Sara, there might be nothing left to-”

“Shut _up_. Send me there, so I can save her.”

Nora stops John from arguing again, suggesting they can't bring Ava back themselves but they surely can do so for Sara if she isn't back within the hour. John knows this kind of magic might kill them both, but it's Ava, it's _Ava_.

He nods, Nora nods, and Sara hurries onto the cot before they change their mind again, heart pounding and hands trembling.

“We'll make sure you have your memories at first, but Neron will try to wipe them as soon as he realizes you're there. Act quickly, get out of there, say anything and everything you have to say to make sure Ava doesn't want to stay there a minute longer,” Nora instructs. “I cannot stress enough how time is of the essence.”

“Gotcha. Be really annoying, really quickly. This truly is my time to shine,” Sara tries to joke but it falls flat because they're all worried out of their minds.

“Anything you have to say to shatter the dream,” Nora says again.

“What the witch is trying to get at, love, is that Sharpie needs to loathe it there. She needs to loathe _you_ there.”

Sara hates John sometimes.

But she nods.

Because really, if hating her is Ava's only shot at getting out of there, her only shot at _surviving_ this, Sara's going to give it her best damn try. Even if she ends up shattering herself in the process.

  
  


//

  
  


There's light coming from the window, a bird chirping happily a few feet from the house is the only sound she can hear for a moment, before the honk of a car makes her groan and turn over and she buries her face in her pillow again, wishing she could stay asleep for one more minute.

Sara gasps beside her, then shakes her awake, calling her name.

Ava turns to her with a frown and a protest is ready on the tip of her tongue, but the moment Sara sees she's awake there's a body on hers, arms circling her and hands grasping her shoulders almost too forcefully.

“You're okay. You're okay,” Sara whispers.

“I am, Sara. Everything's perfect,” she smiles, still frowning. “Are _you_ okay?”

“No, _no_ , I'm not okay. You were gone for two weeks, two weeks, Ava. I thought- When I came into our apartment and saw the mess, I thought you were _gone_.”

She doesn't say dead. She can't think about Ava being dead at all, because she'll paralyse and go insane and right now she needs to act _quickly_.

“It was just a bad dream, Sara,” Ava takes her into her arms, kisses her cheek gently.

Sara shakes her head, suppresses a whimper, because they were fighting, they were broken up, but not here, not here. Here, they're waking up in bed together and there's a bird chirping and the sunlight is warm on her skin.

“Everything's perfect,” Ava says. It lacks conviction, her voice is monotone, like maybe Ava doesn't believe it either.

But God, does Sara wish she could believe it and just stay. If this wasn't Purgatory, if they weren't going to die if Sara indulged this fantasy for just a little while, she would. She _would_.

“This isn't real, Ava. Us. We broke up, we had this huge fight and you asked me to leave, you left me,” Sara pushes out of her arms and stands up. “This- this fantasy about having me back can't be the thing that kills you, _I_ can't be the thing that kills you,” Sara pleads with her.

Ava just frowns, getting up as well.

“You're not making any sense, Sara, we-”

“Mom! Mom,” a little kid barges into the room and throws herself into Ava's arms.

“Sam. You're awake early, my little angel,” Ava hugs her and smiles and walks out like nothing even happened, like they weren't having an argument, like Ava is too distracted by her own happiness to notice that none of this is real. And maybe, yeah, it makes sense, maybe that's the whole point of this.

Sara stays behind for a moment, baffled. When her feet start working again, she follows Ava downstairs.

There are three kids at the table, having breakfast while Ava tries to make conversation with them, or occasionally gives directions such as, “Amy, slow down a little, try to actually chew the banana,” or, “Remi comb your hair before we leave for school, please,” and Sam is sitting in her lap while she eats, Ava smiling as she listens to the three of them banter playfully.

Sara walks to them slowly, a sinking feeling in her chest. She thinks it might be her heart, going down, down, down. Because _this_ , this is Ava's idea of perfect. Their ordinary life, with their ordinary jobs and an average house. Just an average life for them.

She remembers what John said. _Make her loathe it._

“This can't be what you actually want. We're time travelling super heroes, Ava! Why would we give it up to... to play happy family with three kids, why-”

“Did you hit your head?” Ava frowns, setting Sam in her own chair after getting up and walking to Sara, checking her forehead.

“I'm not _sick_ ,” Sara takes her hand gently even as she tries to sound harsh and angry.

She missed touching Ava, holding her hand, having her close. And here, here she can be as close to Ava as she wants to be, for the rest of her life, here she can- no, _no_. It's not real, it's not real, and Sara can't let herself believe it is.

“You're not making sense, Sara. I'm a lawyer, you're a doctor, we're _normal_ , and everything's perfect.”

“This can't be what you truly want,” her voice is pleading now. “You told me, you _promised_ me you didn't want me to be _normal_. You can't choose this over our life, our very real, very much not average life!”

Maybe she can. Maybe she will, even. Maybe Sara's the one who would pick a nightmare that's real over a dream that's a lie, maybe Ava is the one who never wanted anything more than living a perfect lie like this one.

She refuses to believe it, even as her heart sinks further down.

“Ava, we were fighting about the fugitives, you remember? The magical creatures being tortured, the Kaupe escaping. That was two weeks ago, you've been here for _two weeks_.”

Ava frowns, wants to shake her head, but suddenly there's this image in her head of Sara walking out of her office without looking behind and the pain is just... too much. Too real.

“No. No. We're okay. We are. We have to be, we have to be happy because everything is perfect here.”

“Maybe, maybe, but it's not real. Maybe we could have had this life if we were totally different people, but we aren't! I died, I came back to life. You're a clone from the future, Ava. This isn't- this can never be us. Or at least,” her throat feels tight and her heart feels heavy and her head feels every kind of fucked up, “it can never be me.”

Ava frowns, shakes her head.

It makes no sense, no sense.

“We're happy. We're-” Ava points desperately at the picture hanged by the front door. “Aren't we happy?” She walks to it, taking it into her hands, looking down at it. Suddenly, the unsettling feeling comes back in full force and she remembers noticing something wrong with it a long time ago.

Sara sighs, steps closer to her and says, “Laurel's-”

“Happy.”

“Dead,” Sara amends, tears in her eyes. “My sister died, Ava. Damien Darhk killed her. My father is dead. And these,” Sara takes the picture from her, holds it right in front of Ava, pointing at the two people standing on the right, “are actors, you don't have parents, you're a clone.”

“I'm not. I'm not a _clone_ and you're not a _zombie_ , we're normal. We're happy. You're open and your walls are down and you don't close off anymore, we never, ever fight. I don't go to my corner when I get scared. I don't get scared of losing you at all, in fact. I'm the happiest I've ever been, Sara. We're the happiest we've ever been.”

Ava's eyes are shining and she sounds out of breath, but the kids have disappeared into thin air and the very fabric of this world is starting to unravel around them. Sara feels it, tingling oddly into her skin, like her arm has fallen asleep and it needs to wake up again, but with her whole body.

_Quickly_ , she reminds herself, she has to act before Neron gets to them. _You've made her loathe it here, now make her loathe_ you _here._

“I won't stay here, living this farce, playing mom. Not even for love of you, Ava.”

Ava frowns and she shakes her head like she's not buying a single word of what Sara is telling her, but her Purgatory's tearing apart at the seams, the air gets heavier and breathing gets harder, but at the same time Sara feels like they're closer to the surface, somehow.

Ava closes her eyes. Breathes deeply. “None of this is real,” she's pushing the heal of her hand against her forehead, trying to find clarity, a thought she can't quite reach is trying to lure its way into her mind. “No, it can't be. You never loved me like this.”

It hits Sara like three arrows to her chest. Maybe harder.

She has loved Ava with every fibre of her being, with every ounce of her heart, with everything she ever was and is and all she ever had to give she's given to her. And it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough.

This is why Ava wanted to stay, the kids were a distraction, to lessen the doubt. Their families, their jobs, it was all a well crafted frame to the picture that was supposed to trap Ava in her own Purgatory forever: being loved the way she craved to be loved. A love Sara could never quite give her properly, apparently.

“Ava,” she whispers, breathless and heartbroken, desperate and defeated.

And then, everything goes black around them.

  
  


//

  
  


Sara comes to it first, scrambling to get out of her cot and getting to Ava's, hands on her arms as she waits to see if she's going to wake up as well. She does, with a gasp.

There's no warm sunlight, no bird chirping, no car honking. And Sara doesn't call her baby anymore. She stares down at Ava with her eyes wide and perhaps a little hopeful, she stares like maybe she expects Ava to thank her, to apologize to her, to beg for forgiveness.

Ava shoves her arms so that Sara has to let go of her, eyes hardening. She sits up, then looks around the room, as the memories, her real memories, come back to her at once. Like a dream, she still remembers the house, the kids, their families. Like a dream, it's gone now that she's awake, far away from her grasp to never be reached again, and it fucking _kills_ her.

Sara hated it there. And here, they're broken up because Sara doesn't trust her enough, doesn't rely on her. Ava hates it _here_.

She gets up slowly, the room is empty except for them, Nora and John not back yet. She turns to Sara, who's staring at her with a frown, shoulders tense, like maybe she's not herself, like maybe she hasn't truly come back because she hasn't jumped into Sara's arms kissing her and thanking her yet.

Like maybe Neron truly got to her.

Maybe he has. He _has_. Just not in the way Sara was afraid he would.

“You should've left me there,” it comes out angry and low and Ava can't look at her, can't bear what she'd see, so she stares down at the cot between them.

“Ava, you would have died.”

“I don't care,” spiteful, bitter.

“You don't mean that. It wasn't real.”

“ _I'm_ not real, Sara! I'm a clone,” she sounds well and truly pissed off now. “I wasn't, in there. I was _real_ there, I was happy and- and everything was _perfect_.”

“It might have been,” Sara swallows, and suddenly she isn't as confrontational as she had been in Purgatory, she isn't scolding Ava for wanting to be average, she isn't hard anymore. Ava was too furious to notice until the very moment Sara looks at her like she still hopes this can end differently, she still hopes Ava might understand, voice soft and eyes softer. “It might have been perfect, but it wasn't me. It wasn't _us_. And what we have here,” Sara rounds the cot, takes her hand gently, slowly, as not to startle Ava. “This is real, you are real.” Her voice is so doubtless, Ava feels her resolve starting to crumble a little.

Ava's shoulders sag, she looks down and then closes her eyes. How many arguments can one person win with the same sentence? She tears her hand away from Sara's.

“I don't think I am. And _we_ certainly aren't. We live completely different lives, it took you two weeks to realize I was even missing. And before that, you were lying to me about Mona and the Kaupe and-”

“Hank was working with Neron. We were right.”

“I don't care, Sara. _I_ wasn't working with him, you should've come to me, you should have trusted me. You've been doing it for months, you didn't trust me when magical beings showed up, so you lied to my face about Constantine's visit. You lied about Charlie, about why she was here. You lied about Mona. You wanna do this without me? Fine by me. But you can't have just the parts of me that you're okay with. If you want someone who indulges you when you mistreat them and runs back to you the second you call, try another AVA, I'm not the right one for the job.”

It's a low blow, lower than the floor, and Ava knows it. Sara, she knows, loves her. Maybe not in the way Ava wished she could, but Sara loves her in her own way. She isn't asking of Ava something akin of changing her very essence, she isn't trying to mold her, to shape her differently, to turn her into another version of the same AVA. But Ava has to say something, to spit out something, because she was _happy_. And now, what waits for her is pain and loss and heartbreak and she doesn't want to go through it but she has to. She has to. But she doesn't have to be complacent about it.

“That's not what I want at _all_ , I want- Ava. Ava!”

Sara calls after her, but Ava leaves without looking back, just as Sara did two weeks before, opening a portal into her own apartment and trying to stop seeing the same thing every time she closes her eyes: Sara, smiling broadly, the sunlight hitting her frame in a mesmerizing way, as a bird chirps in the background, telling her “Good morning, baby,” in the softest voice Ava ever remembers hearing.

  
  


//

  
  


Three days of complete silence is all Sara can take apparently, because that's how long she manages to wait before she opens a portal into their- _Ava's_ living room.

For a moment, she thinks maybe Ava isn't home, and there's hot wild unbounded panic in the pit of her stomach for a second that seems to stretch on into eternity. Then, something clanks and someone swears and a head peeks up from the couch, only to slam down again a moment later to retrieve the fallen glass – not broken, thankfully, because Ava can't be bothered enough to get up and get another glass, so she fills it again with the whiskey she has within reach, on the ground, half a feet from the couch.

Sara walks to it, she moves Ava's feet and sits down, putting them in her lap a second later. Ava doesn't stop her, but doesn't make it easy for her.

“I was getting worried. Nate says you haven't been to work since being back.”

“It's been barely a day,” Ava sighs.

“Three.”

“Ah. Better make sure I wasn't kidnapped again. Gotcha.”

“I didn't wait three days for that,” Sara scoffs, but the ' _this time_ ' gets stuck in her throat and burning regret fills her heart. “Nate says you were still answering his texts up until two hours ago.”

“No sleeping while drunk, noted,” Ava takes another swing from her glass as sarcasm spills out of her mouth and Sara isn't surprised at the passive antagonism but it still hurts her.

Sara takes the glass from her hands, downing the whisky and reaching for the bottle to fill it up again, and emptying it with a long gulp immediately after. It's a move like any other to have the glass and the bottle and put them down somewhere Ava can't reach for them again, because despite Sara feeling like the world is collapsing in on itself, she still wants to do this, to fix things, or at least try. Because it's Ava, it's _Ava_.

“Why are you here?” Ava asks, eyes glued to Sara's hands, one is on Ava's knee and the other is gently caressing her calf. “I'm _fine_ ,” Ava doesn't even wait for Sara to answer because she already knows what she's gonna say. “I'm doing just great. Nate and Nora have been here, to make sure I wasn't dead. Too bad they didn't think of doing it during the two weeks I was in a demon's _hands_.”

Sara goes rigid, she stops breathing, her hands tremble against Ava's pj's because- because-

“He didn't-” Ava shakes her head. “It's just bruises and cuts that look like runes. He was waiting for his girlfriend to be possessing me, at least that's what Nora says. Tabitha, apparently.”

Sara keeps looking at her like Ava will never be rid of this, of this pain, of this burden. Like maybe neither of them would ever be.

“Nora was in jail and Nate was distracted by his dad being evil. Gary told us you were just taking a leave of absence, and he wasn't worried like he was last time when you disappeared after we-” she swallows. She forces the words out, despite the scolding burn they leave on her tongue, “after we broke up. Hank told him, and Nate, you were due back soon and perfectly okay.”

“And you? What was distracting _you_?” Ava wonders bitterly, and when her mouth opens again Sara is sure there's a name on the tip of her tongue she doesn't wanna hear, because she can't keep doing this, they can't keep doing this, and it's not fair.

“Nothing. I was thinking about you every minute of every day and dreaming about you every night and yelling at Mona that it was her fault, that she took you from me. But I was- I _am_ the one who took you from me, with my own stupidity and immaturity.”

Ava looks like something bitter is on the tip of her tongue again, but she recoils and closes her eyes. She retracts her legs from Sara's touch, sitting up to hug her knees to her chest, her cheek pressing to them as she looks away.

Sara thinks she looks so small, so tired. Ava thinks maybe Sara's right. Maybe they can never be rid of this, Ava knows she surely can't. She can never forget. She can never turn this into a lesson or into something better than what it is: the realization she's not made for this life, for this reality. She feels like throwing up all of a sudden, but she breathes deeply and swallows down the lump in her throat as best as she can.

“It wasn't your fault,” she admits, softly, softer than any other words she's said to Sara since before they started fighting. “None of it. It was mine.”

She turns her head resting her chin on her knee and looking up at Sara with defeat and sadness and something rooted so deep down that Sara is suddenly certain she's staring into Ava's very core, her very soul, and this goes so far beyond Neron that, not for the first time, she thinks this might be something that can never be fixed.

“No, it wasn't, it was Neron's fault, he's a _demon_ -”

“He knew I'd choose to stay because everything was _perfect_. And if I couldn't be happy somewhere perfect, then,” she looks away again, falling silent for a moment. “I'm just not built for this world, Sara. This very much real, very much messy world that I don't fit in at all. I can't ever be happy here, reality can't be perfect and I can't even... I can't even be happy with perfection. I tried so hard to be, I tried to be a good daughter, a good wife, a good moth- a good mother,” she chokes on the word because fuck this, _fuck_ this. She closes her eyes and Remi smiles at her from his seat at the table and Amy eats too quickly and Sam bounces in her lap happily like any two years old would and fuck missing kids that never existed, that will never exist. Fuck Neron for making them perfect and _hers_ and fuck Sara for peeling her away from them.

Sara's hand is on her face, wiping away tears Ava wasn't even aware of.

“It was perfect, it _was_. And I couldn't be happy.”

“Because it wasn't real,” Sara says softly, hands pulling her arms until Ava lets go of her own knees and Sara's sneaking below them, so Ava's legs are thrown over hers and she can cradle Ava's face with her hands, and they're so close Ava could kiss her if she wanted to. “And you knew, deep down. And what we have... Ava I'm in love with you, I'll always be in love with you, and I'll do better and be honest and more open and we can work on having a better work partnership,” she promises without hesitation, like she thought this through. Like she isn't just _saying_ this but _means_ it. “What we have here might not be perfect, but it's _ours_.” Sara's forehead touches hers gently, their noses brush and Ava lets go of a trembling breath. “Can you live with that?”

Ava doesn't know. What she knows is: she has to live, she can't live without Sara, she can't go on destroying herself. So this is the only thing she can do, this is all she can have, and it'll have to be enough. She has to be enough for Sara, somehow, she has to be better, to be okay, to make it. Maybe she can't be happy here, but Sara can and Ava will gladly go to hell before she keeps happiness from Sara.

She forces Sara's hands away from her cheeks and for a second Sara's eyes are desperate again, but then Ava's tugging her arms around herself and pulling her in, and then they're kissing. It tastes like tears and whiskey and something left unsaid between them, but it also... it feels like coming home.

Ava pulls her down as she lays back and for a moment they're tangled up and uncomfortable, Sara's legs below hers and her torso above Ava's, but then Sara moves swiftly until she's standing between her legs, hips pressing closely to hers, and Ava sighs into her mouth.

“ _Good morning, baby_ ,” the voice in her head is Sara's but it's... not. Her mind is so fucked up, she's still beyond tipsy and she shouldn't- they shouldn't do this.

She bites Sara's lower lip and her nails dig into Sara's back with what she's pretty sure is too much strength, there'll be pain and marks but she doesn't care, she just wants it not to be soft and perfect and faded at the edges. She needs this to be real, to be the thing that makes the fuzzy memories from a place she can never get back finally slip away.

Sara pushes closer and bites her neck, her collarbone, her still clad shoulder and she wants this, Ava _wants_ this, in a way she's never wanted anything _there_.

She pushes Sara's shoulders and she gets up immediately, afraid she's fucked this up, afraid Ava will throw her out, afraid... afraid. Like Ava's made of glass or porcelain or something as fragile. She almost scoffs, almost. Instead, she kisses Sara again, pulling her closer by the hips, then bending down a little and pulling on Sara's thighs until they're hooked around Ava's waist. They're still kissing when Ava starts walking to the stairs, and when Sara rolls her hips and gasps, breaking the kiss, Ava sinks her teeth into Sara's neck and hold her closer.

“ _I can't believe he almost took this from me_ ,” the thought startles her. Sara, this Sara, is hers. Is real. Her Sara. And Ava almost gave it up for a fantasy, for a pale echo of this. Neron did his best and it was the perfect life but Sara, like this, hugging Ava, whispering soft, raspy words in her ear, this can't be duplicated by a demon.

Sara's on her bed, tugging her in, and Ava still hears “ _Good morning, baby_ ,” but it's farther and faded and she ignores it. Sara's real, Sara's better when she isn't too soft and too perfect. Sara's flawless with all her flaws.

And Ava sinks into it with everything she has and starts giving again and gives, gives, gives until there's nothing left again.

  
  


//

  
  


There's no bird chirping, just a canary staring down at her when she wakes up. It's still dark outside, and a siren wails in the distance because this is still D.C. after all.

“Hey.”

“Hi,” Sara smiles softly. “Couldn't sleep,” she says when she realizes she's been staring.

Her hand is splayed on Ava's abdomen and she's tracing a path with slow, gentle movements. Ava glances at the clock, she's been asleep barely an hour, she wonders if Sara's been looking at her the whole time, afraid she'd disappear if she got distracted.

Ava traces her spine with a finger and then tangles it in Sara's hair, bringing her down so their lips can meet. The kiss is slow, languid, unhurried. Sara keeps tracing her skin in random patterns, maybe she needs the contact. They stay awake, lying next to each other, and when Sara has her head pressed to Ava's chest, ear listening closely to Ava's heartbeat, but their eyes not meeting at all, Ava feels like she can speak again.

“I've lived the same day over and over, for like two-hundred times,” she whispers in a hurry, trying not to bite the words back.

Sara's hand stops moving for a moment, but then resumes the lines and she says, “You were there for _months_.”

It's not a question, not really, but Ava still feels like she needs to answer somehow. “Time was still, it was always the same Tuesday. There was a bird chirping every morning outside our window followed by a car honking and then you-” she wets her lips, “ _she_ would say good morning to me. There was a picture right next to the front door and every morning I'd straighten it and every morning I felt there was something wrong with it, until I didn't anymore, until everything seemed like it had always been that way. I took the kids to school, talked to my mom everyday. And they weren't real, but I still-” she stops, before she can say it, before she can tell Sara the thing that's going to ruin everything: _I still wish they were_.

“-miss them?” Sara asks.

“Yeah,” she murmurs. _Liar, liar, liar_.

“I'm sorry.”

What else could she ever say? She smiles when Sara looks at her and suddenly feels like talking at all was a mistake. So she kisses Sara, turns and presses into her and tries to be as honest with her lips and hands as she can't be with her words.

She tries, she does, and for a while it's even enough.

  
  


They keep seeing each other often outside of work and they avoid each other while on the job, the Legends keep tracking fugitives and Ava stays in her office and handles the bureaucracy and rarely has even time to leave it anyway, so avoiding Sara is easy. The Legends screw up epically with a dragon egg, Sara goes into her office ready for the arguing, the scolding, the reproaching her for not having asked for help. But they don't do that anymore, the fighting. Instead, Ava locks the door and presses her into the desk, kissing her like nothing's ever been wrong at all.

  
  


Ava goes into Neron's cell one day and he stares back with Desmond's eyes. Ava didn't know him, doesn't know him, feels sorry for him because she survived Neron and he didn't. She wonders if he had softness inside his eyes, if he was good. Probably he deserved to live more than she did, she isn't even human, she isn't even real.

Neron looks at her with curiosity and then smiles.

“Oh, Ava. You missed me already?”

“Fuck _you_.”

He keeps smiling. “ _Someone_ doesn't like the truth.”

Ava's jaw clenches and twitches and she leaves quietly. She wanted to be sure he was still trapped up and he is, she has no reason to be there.

Sara finds her three hours later passed out on her couch with an empty bottle of whiskey on the floor and no glass in sight. She helps her up and into bed and everything feels foggy, but Sara isn't yelling so that's something.

  
  


They, of course, do not talk about it.

They never talk about anything anymore.

Ava pushes at her anger with a resolve rooted in every fear she's ever had and Sara tries her very best and bites back every harsh answer or sarcastic remark whenever Ava does something reckless or plain stupid – like going after Gary _alone_ , when Nora saves her Sara looks like there's storm in her eyes and thunder in her voice, but she just says that she's glad Ava's safe, and nothing else.

Tabitha ends up being the fucking Fairy Godmother because why the hell not, this is how their lives work out more often than not. And Gary's evil. But at least Neron's still trapped into the Time Bureau.

  
  


//

  
  


They don't fight. They never fight. They never even argue.

But they know, they _know_ , things aren't as they used to be. Everything's so fucked up now, they can't even fit properly together anymore, even their silences are too much sometimes, and Ava knows it's her fault, she knows she can't go back to being the same because whenever she closes her eyes the “ _Good morning, baby_ ” and “ _Everything's perfect_ ” resonate within her like the stoke of a bell, rhythmic and echoing long after she hears the voices.

One night, Ava's been silent more than usual, Sara asks the darkness of their- _Ava's_ bedroom: “Are you happy? At all?”

Ava stares at the ceiling the same way Sara is and answers to the darkness: “I wasn't even happy when everything was perfect. Not really. And this isn't- we aren't-” she closes her eyes and bites the inside of her cheek. “I'm trying. I really am.”

“I know,” Sara reassures. “I am, too.”

Ava wants to reach out, to touch her hand, to tell her she still loves her and it doesn't matter if they don't make it, Sara was the closest she could ever get to perfection and happiness and everything she can never have. But it feels like an excuse, so she keeps her eyes closed.

She pretends to be asleep when Sara leaves. It's easier this way. If there's no yelling, no door shutting, no goodbye. If they miss each other silently and move on, instead of lying, of saying it was nobody's fault it didn't work. She knows it's because of her, because she was never quite right, never quite real.

Ava feels her heart shatter but she knows this is for the best: Sara deserves so much more than this. Than being unhappy with someone because they feel they owe each other something. Sara's the love of her life. But she can't be the love of Sara's. She can't. Because Sara deserves so much better than her, than this.

She cries into Sara's pillow and wills the darkness to swallow her whole.

  
  


//

  
  


The very next day, Neron's gone. It takes him two hours to take over the Bureau, the work of Ava's life is gone, just like that, and Gary's betrayal burns more than she thought it could. The only thing she can save is Nora, but then again, Nora saved her first so she's just settling a debt.

They board the Waverider, nowhere else is safe, but that means going to the woman who's left her less than twenty-four hours before. It's still their only choice, especially since Ava has maybe, possibly, thrown herself between Nora and an incoming spell and now she's a little bit dying. But Gideon saves her, with Constantine's help.

“What were you _thinking_?!”

Now. _Now_ there's yelling. Finally.

“I wasn't. Nora was in danger,” she says calmly.

“Why would you go after him alone, Ava, when you-”

“Nora needed me. She's my best friend. She's the only person who isn't my friend just because I'm your- I was your-” she swallows, voice so tiny and trembling on the last three words, and she wishes she could say it's the spell, but they all know it's not.

“That's _bullshit_ ,” Sara yells, and stops pacing the bridge to give her a disbelieving look.

“Yeah, it is,” Zari's voice makes her turn and they're all standing there, eavesdropping like they're a bunch of kids they've adopted trying to stop their parents from fighting.

“None of us is your friend 'cause your shagging the boss,” Charlie says.

“It's the cookies,” Mick nods and Nate elbows him. “And, you know, other stuff. You're a misfit. You're one of us.”

“Surprisingly, I agree with Mick,” Ray smiles and they all nod.

“Why would you go in without calling your own damn team is unfathomable to me,” Sara tells her and resumes her pacing. “But you're both here and okay. And John is ready to do this, so we need to move now. You're sure the exorcise will work this time, right?”

“I am. I can save Desmond and banish Neron to hell once and for all.”

“Then we're going in. Right now. They won't expect it so soon and surprising them it's half of our plan. Be ready in ten.” When no one moves she adds, “scatter, go,” and makes a shoo motion with her hands until they're alone.

The silence is defeaning.

“Gideon sent an S.O.S., I didn't want to wake you.”

“You don't have to explain. I understand.”

She doesn't. She doesn't understand how they're not working, how everything's so fucked up, and she's been trying her best but now she isn't anymore. She's finally well and truly broken.

Because, well... Gary was the one who attacked them, sure, but Tabitha, doing his dirty work, was the one who looked at Ava with pity in her eyes and a soft low murmur of “oh my dear girl, he doesn't need you anymore, but he'll still take you, you have his marks all over your soul,” and Ava knows now. She should have known all along, really, because she was never strong enough, she can't defeat him and she knows now she can't outrun him; they're barging straight into his den and there's a real possibility she isn't coming out of it. And it's okay, it is.

_Liar_.

“Ava-”

“Really, I understand.”

_Liar, liar, liar._

“I was gonna say, I love you. I won't stop trying.”

_Liar_ , Ava accuses her in her head with a voice that doesn't even sound like her own.

“I love you, too.”

  
  


//

  
  


They get closer than Ava thought they would, Gary's distracted playing time bro's with Nate and Ray, while Zari, Charlie and Mona are trapping Tabitha.

Ava, Sara, Nora and Constantine are surrounding Neron and for a moment, for a moment she thinks they're actually gonna make it.

Then, Sara is thrown against the wall and there are chains made of cement sprouting from the wall and keeping her still and Neron raises his hands and blocks both John and Nora, invisible hands chocking the two of them, lifting them off the ground.

But he's spread thin and Ava is armed, her gun is trained on him and she has a clear shot and she can just shoot him between the eyes. He's out of hands to use magic and Ava _hates_ him. She's sorry about Desmond, she is. But this is either him or the rest of the world and the choice is suddenly so simple. There's nothing John could say – even if he could talk, if he wasn't choking on air – and there is certainly _nothing_ Neron himself could say that could ever, _ever_ stop her, that could ever-

“I can give it back to you.”

Ava's gun lowers two inches and she swallows the sudden knot in her throat. Maybe she heard wrong, she _must_ have heard wrong.

“Even better, I can make it more real. You don't even have to live just one day on repeat. I could make it a year, make it more fun. We could make some twists to how she was,” he nods to Sara, then smirks, _smirks_. “I've seen her through your eyes now, she can be exactly as she is here. As you want her to be.”

“ _Good morning, baby_.”

“ _Good morning, my love_.”

The voice in her head is stronger now, it makes her squint her eyes to focus back on reality.

“Oh, Sharpie,” John chokes out. “I'm so sorry.”

“Fuck,” Nora gasps. “How could we miss this, he was still in her head this whole time, he was still-”

Neron twists his fingers and Nora is silenced.

Ava feels it now, the remnants of him still in her blood, she almost feels it oozing through the runes carved into her skin slithering within her, poisoning her.

“I can give it all back to you, Ava,” he offers. “Remi misses you, you know? You know Sam won't go to sleep unless you tuck her in. Amy won't eat anything but red things ever since you've been gone.”

“Shut up,” Ava says, it's meant to be a command but it comes out like a shaken, broken gasp. “Shut up. They're not real.”

“They are to you, and I can give them back. I can give you Sara back.”

“Sara's right here,” Ava says, but it's so unconvinced even to her own ears.

“But this Sara doesn't love you, she thinks you're too much effort, too difficult, too hard to deal with.”

“I don't, Ava, I love you,” Sara reminds her with a gasp but then Neron shuts her up as well.

This conversation is just between the two of them, his offer is just for Ava.

“Of course she'd say that, but we know the truth. Lying is easier for her, but _you_ know the truth, Ava: you're not real, so how could what you two have be?”

“He's manipulating you, Sharpie, you're too smart to-”

And now John's lips are sealed as well. It's just them, just them, and Ava's hanging by his every word by this point.

“She never loved you like she did there,” Neron says.

Ava feels blind hot raging anger for a moment, but there's a voice inside her head again, there's a voice telling her it's true, it's _true_. And this time, it does sound like hers.

“You're right,” she whispers, her gun lowering a little but still aimed in his direction. “You are. When we were there, she loved me like it had always been easy, like our love never had to go through trial by fire. But it did, we did. Love's not supposed to be easy, it's supposed to be _worth_ it.”

“Is it?” Neron smirks again. “I can _make_ it easy. I can make sure everything's exactly as you want it to be, as normal as you want it to be. I can make everything... _perfect_.”

John can't do magic without his words, but Nora's powers have never been that chained. She's still fighting, Ava can see it, she's furious and so deeply protective of Ava sometimes, it's no wonder Neron has sweat on his forehead now. And Ava feels, for the first time in weeks, like she can think clearly again.

_Perfect_.

Normal.

Easy.

She was never normal, she never wanted to be, she surely had never wanted easy. He was clawing at her, pushing her into loving the cage he'd built her, but he didn't know her well enough then. He had to strain himself just to make Ava believe it could be real, let alone that it could be perfect.

Her hands are steadier.

_It's not perfect, but it's ours._

“I don't want something perfect. I want something real. My life, it might not be perfect, but it's mine. I love Sara exactly as she is, and what we have... it might not be perfect, but it's ours.”

She shoots three bullets into his right leg and suddenly Nora's free and throwing him against a wall, John starting to chant as soon as he's unbid and thirty seconds later, Neron's gone. Just like that. Neron's _gone_.

  
  


//

  
  


“You shouldn't have been able to resist him for so long. It's mesmerizing that you did.”

“It's a bloody miracle, it's what the witch means.”

“John,” Nora scoffs.

“It's my fault. I should've known- I should've known something was wrong. I thought you were just traumatized, or that-” Sara's voice is every kind of shaken.

“How could you have known? _I_ didn't even know,” Ava reasons.

Sara nods, but her eyes are distant and she looks like she wants to run from the room as fast as she can.

“We're going home for the night, we'll deal with Gary tomorrow,” Sara says, and Ava opens a portal to her apartment before she can stop and ask Sara if she means that when she called Ava's house her home.

They sit on the couch, Sara's on the very edge of it, still looking ready to bolt. Ava sits down close to her, but without touching her.

“I'll understand if you want me to leave,” Sara says in a whisper and Ava frowns because, isn't Sara supposed to be mad at her?

“You saved me and I antagonized you for it. You stuck by my side when I was a mess and miserable all the time and made you miserable as well. You've been by my side even when _I_ didn't even want to be by my side. Why on Earth would I want you to leave?”

“You weren't you. And I didn't even consider it might not be.”

“It _was_ me, Sara. I just had this voice in my head that I felt obligated to follow, but it was me. And you shouldn't forgive me for acting like I did just because-”

“You were possessed. Ava, Gary almost murdered us all, John's right when he says it's a miracle you were almost yourself, you fought him, you won.”

Sara's eyes shine with pride and Ava feels her heart melting, and she wonders how the fact that everything she felt for Sara was dampened could sneak past her conscious knowledge.

“Well, I had help. No matter how many times he told me we weren't perfect, I kissed you and suddenly nothing else could compare. Thinking back on it now, it felt like some of the things I was feeling were turned up at full volume and others were silenced down. But when I was with you, I always felt more like myself.”

The way Sara's looking at her now, like Ava handed her a piece of the moon, is worth all of it. Every bit of it.

“You mean that?”

“Of course I do.”

Sara takes her hand, hugs her so tight for a moment neither can breathe.

They still have so much they need to talk about, but for now, for now, everything's exactly as it should be.

  
  


//

  
  


There's blinding light coming from the window, annoying and too hot on her skin. A siren wails in the distance, making her head pound with the noise, too high pitched in her half asleep sate. She groans, unpleased, and buries her face into Sara's neck, wishing she could stay asleep for one more minute.

Sara chuckles. “Wake up, baby, Gideon left us a voicemail. Barry, Ollie and Kara called, we have a new emergency.”

Ava sighs, rolling away from Sara. “You have to be kidding me.”

“Wish I was. Let's go, a new adventure awaits!”

Sara bolts up in bed, then uses the sheet as a makeshift cape and strikes a Supergirl pose after tying it around her neck. Ava laughs and kisses her on the nose, overridden with cuteness.

As Sara pouts and then tugs her out of bed, Ava thinks that perfection is definitely overrated. She would pick their real, messy, amazing life every single time.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> It would be kindly awesome of you to let me know what you thought about this. Thank you so much for reading!
> 
> I'm on tumblr @thetruthaboutlovecomesat3am for any questions/prompts you might have


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